The Devil's Garden Crew Two, a crew from the Dept of Corrections in Alturas, CA. went to work getting out hot spots off Summit Road. The Loma fire high above Santa Cruz didn't grow much Monday October 26, 2009 and residents were allowed back in although questions remained about Cal Fire's role in the start of the fire.

Photo: Brant Ward, The Chronicle

The Devil's Garden Crew Two, a crew from the Dept of Corrections in...

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Cal Fire crews worked on hot spots along the Loma fire area. The Loma fire high above Santa Cruz didn't grow much Monday October 26, 2009 and residents were allowed back in although questions remained about Cal Fire's role in the start of the fire.

Photo: Brant Ward, The Chronicle

Cal Fire crews worked on hot spots along the Loma fire area. The...

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Cal Fire investigators worked an area near Mount Madonna and Summit Roads, the suspected area where a control burn may have set off the fire. The Loma fire high above Santa Cruz didn't grow much Monday October 26, 2009 and residents were allowed back in although questions remained about Cal Fire's role in the start of the fire.

Photo: Brant Ward, The Chronicle

Cal Fire investigators worked an area near Mount Madonna and Summit...

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Fire crews rested on Summit Road not far from where they believe the fire started. The Loma fire high above Santa Cruz didn't grow much Monday October 26, 2009 and residents were allowed back in although questions remained about Cal Fire's role in the start of the fire.

A brigade of more than 1,500 firefighters made big gains Monday in a battle against wind-whipped flames in the Santa Cruz Mountains, allowing dozens of evacuated residents to return home. But amid an atmosphere of relief, questions swirled about how the blaze began.

Among the possible scenarios, state fire officials acknowledged, is that the Loma Fire was started by firefighters themselves.

Darrell Wolf, a battalion chief for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, said he had recently supervised crews that did controlled burning of brush piles in an area near where investigators believe the fire ignited at 3 a.m. Sunday in the hills east of Highway 17 and north of Watsonville.

Wolf, though, said that the burns had been tightly controlled and that he ended them Wednesday after noticing that bushes were drying out despite a rainstorm that swept through the week before.

He said he returned to the area Saturday afternoon while clearing out culverts and did not see any smoldering.

"Is it a possibility? Sure," Wolf said. "If it was something we caused, we're going to look at what policies we have in effect, what policies we can put in effect, and what more can we do. If we have issues, we'll address them."

Trailer burns

The Loma Fire burned a trailer and two outbuildings soon after it started, officials said. Resident Joe Waddle said he had lost two storage sheds full of belongings and that the trailer belonged to his brother, who was too upset to talk about it.

As of late Monday, the blaze was 55 percent contained, though firefighters were concerned about the potential for high wind today. Officials lowered their estimate for the size of the fire to 485 acres, down from 600 the day before.

Four firefighters have been injured, including one who may have broken a leg Monday. No structures are now considered threatened.

Hands and knees

On Monday afternoon, a team of investigators worked to determine the fire's cause near the corner of Summit and Loma Prieta roads.

"A lot of it comes down to getting down on your hands and knees in the dirt - or ash," said Kevin Colburn, a Cal Fire spokesman.

The investigators worked on a mountainside with views of Watsonville farms to the south and the Santa Cruz coast to the west. Residents used rough dirt roads to return to their remote homes - some opulent abodes, some trailers.

Residents said they supported controlled burning by Cal Fire, but questioned why it was done last week. Some, including Waddle, said they had seen brush smoldering at times and that no one had been around to make sure a fire didn't spread.

Wait for the rains

"Usually it's safe," said Richard Robinson, a 60-year-old window-covering installer who has lived in the Santa Cruz Mountains for 16 years. "Usually they do it in the rainy season."

That Cal Fire was doing controlled burns angered Channing Verden, an area resident whom authorities have accused of starting the Summit Fire of May 2008, which scorched more than 4,000 acres and destroyed 132 structures.

Verden, charged with one felony count of unlawfully causing a fire, denies that he sparked the blaze while clearing brush for a landowner, as authorities allege. He says Cal Fire is to blame because it failed to fully put out a controlled burn that got away days earlier from Waddle, his neighbor.

Wolf said Cal Fire's controlled burns were done to protect the area's watersheds. Last week, he said, he supervised burns done by firefighters as well as inmates who work for the fire agency.

The crews gather brush in piles about 10 feet wide and carve a protective dirt circle around them, Wolf said. The firefighters then light the pile and stay with it until it burns out. A fire engine then douses the pile, he said.

Other options for thinning the brush - chipping it or hauling it to a landfill - are not as efficient, he said.